Roman Archaism in Depictions of Apollo in the Augustan Period
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Bowling Green State University ScholarWorks@BGSU Honors Projects Honors College Spring 5-2-2016 Roman Archaism in Depictions of Apollo in the Augustan Period Alisha Sanders [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.bgsu.edu/honorsprojects Part of the Ancient History, Greek and Roman through Late Antiquity Commons, Ancient, Medieval, Renaissance and Baroque Art and Architecture Commons, Classical Archaeology and Art History Commons, Political History Commons, Sculpture Commons, and the Social History Commons Repository Citation Sanders, Alisha, "Roman Archaism in Depictions of Apollo in the Augustan Period" (2016). Honors Projects. 281. https://scholarworks.bgsu.edu/honorsprojects/281 This work is brought to you for free and open access by the Honors College at ScholarWorks@BGSU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Honors Projects by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks@BGSU. ROMAN ARCHAISM IN DEPICTIONS OF APOLLO IN THE AUGUSTAN PERIOD ALISHA SANDERS HONORS PROJECT Submitted to the University Honors Program at Bowling Green State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for graduation with UNIVERSITY HONORS 2 MAY 2016 Dr. Sean V. Leatherbury, School of Art, Art History Division, Advisor Dr. Heath A. Diehl, Department of English & Honors College, Advisor Sanders 2 Abstract: At the end of the first century BCE, the Roman Empire was being established, and Augustus Caesar was taking sole power of the Roman world. In order to spread the values and concepts that he wanted to perpetuate in the new political order, he revived an archaistic art style based on that of the archaic period of ancient Greece. This study is focused on works that include depictions of Apollo because one of the first and most studied examples of Augustus’s use of Roman archaism was the decorative program of the Temple of Apollo on the Palatine. Apollo is an especially significant figure to consider in a study on a revival of a Greek style because he was originally a Greek god that was absorbed into the Roman pantheon, just as some of the stylistic elements from archaic Greek works had been appropriated into Roman artwork to create Roman archaism. Augustus also considered Apollo as an ancestor and used Apollo to rally support during the Battle of Actium in 31 BCE. By looking at some of the works of Roman archaism created in the time period of Augustus’s rule that depict Apollo, this paper argues that there is a connection between certain ideals Augustus attempted to promote to the Roman people and the archaistic style. The ideals being emphasized included a restoration of religious piety, a subtle reminder of military power, a grounded history for the royal family, and a new youthful ideal for depictions of Roman people. Key Terms: Roman Empire Augustus Family Style Archaism Piety Art Youth Apollo Military Sanders 3 In the field of art history, the time period surrounding the appearance of the first emperor of the Roman Empire is an engaging one in regards to art and artistic development. The political structure of Rome was changing from a republic to an empire, civil wars were rampant as various military generals used the support of their troops to gain power by force, and prominent politicians, such as Julius Caesar, were being assassinated. In terms of political structure, a large group of senators were the primary leaders of the Roman Republic, and every male Roman citizen had a say in politics by electing members of assemblies, which in turn elected magistrates (Mouritsen 2001). On the other hand, a singular figure, Augustus Caesar, dominated the beginning of the Roman Empire and held all the main positions of power in Rome. During this tumultuous time, the ideas that were expressed to the Roman people through art were changing in order to reinforce the new political order. For Paul Zanker (1998), a prominent scholar in the study of Augustan art, the “cultural program” that Augustus was instating “was nothing less than a complete moral revival” that “required a new visual language” (2-3). This “cultural program” makes early imperial art especially suitable for stimulating art historical thought as this art established some of the core values and concepts that the Empire was being built upon, including a restoration of Roman religion and an emphasis on the importance of family. In general, new rulers occasionally use distinctive artistic styles in order to create a new artistic tradition that emphasizes their political message (Kellum 1985, 169). For Augustus, the successful transitioning of Rome from a republic to an empire required artistic and stylistic choices by him and other patrons for art and architecture that reflected some of the values and concepts that he wanted to perpetuate in the new political order that was underway at the end of the first century BCE. This paper will be studying a very specific style—an archaistic style—that was consciously revived at the beginning of the Roman Empire during the lifetime of Augustus. Sanders 4 The archaistic style that will be discussed will be referred to as Roman archaism. This style is based on that of the archaic period of ancient Greece, which is considered by modern art historians to have lasted from 800-480 BCE. The naming of this period is based on the Greek word αρχή, “arche,” meaning origin or beginning. This was not the actual beginning of Greek art, but recognizable figural work began to be common in this period. While there was certainly artistic variety within the time frame of archaic Greece, figural works in sculpture tended to have some defining characteristics, such as a stiff and frontal pose, an “Archaic smile,” plated hair, and dovetail drapery. This is especially true for kouroi and korai figures, which were figures of young men and women that were used as votive figures and grave markers during the archaic period of ancient Greece. One such kore figure from the Athenian Acropolis [Figure 1] shows the typical stylistic features of an archaic Greek work. Her posture is stiff, her pose frontal, her hair is styled in long spiral plaits that reach mid-torso; she has an “Archaic smile”—a slight upturning of the mouth that creates a serene expression on the faces of many figures—and the edges of her clothing create zigzagging dovetail drapery. Artists employed this dovetail drapery mostly on depictions of females; males were depicted nude as per Greek conventions. Archaism refers to the style of any piece created after 480 BCE that still retains elements of the archaic Greek style—stiff postures, dovetail drapery, and an “Archaic smile” among others. It is an archaistic style rather than simply an archaic one because it combined the older archaic elements in new ways to create a unique Roman style. Mark Fullerton (1990), a Professor in the Department of Classics at The Ohio State University, suggests that a Classical era statue of Hekate Epipyrgidia made by Alkamene, a marble sculptor, in the fifth century BCE was one of the first examples of an archaistic work. Copies of this work [Figure 2] were made earlier than Augustus’s time in the Hellenistic period of ancient Rome from 323-31 BCE. Sanders 5 For the Romans, the appropriation of Greek style “implied a self-conscious set of aesthetic choices” (Elsner 2003, 6). For Augustus, an archaistic style was not by itself appealing, but its use as a “form for particular contemporary themes and contents” was (Hölscher 2006, 250). So, aesthetic choices such as Roman archaism were made deliberately with specific uses and themes in mind. While the Romans appropriated Greek artwork in many ways—copying statues, importing artwork and architectural elements, looting Greek sites, etc.—only the archaistic style frequently used under Augustus will be discussed here. He revitalized an archaistic style based on ancient Greek models, raising the question of what his reasons might have been for doing so. For Maria Strazzula (1990), the author of the principle book about the terracotta reliefs at the Temple of Apollo to be discussed later, this Augustan archaism “is a very special phenomenon, extremely limited in time and destined to never happen again” in Roman history; “it is taken up in an original vision, shaping it to [patrons’] needs” (128). While art historians may never know for sure what Augustus’s reasons were for reviving Roman archaism, there does seem to be a connection between the style and Augustus’s politics of the time. As a style, Roman archaism seems to have been used more often in the early Roman Empire than in the Roman Republic perhaps due to some of the ideals that Augustus wanted to convey to the Roman people. By looking at some of the works of Roman archaism created in the time period of Augustus’s rule, this paper suggests that style can be used as a starting point for a focused analysis of the ideals being emphasized in the works, which included a restoration of religious piety, a reminder of military power, a grounded history for the royal family, and a new youthful ideal for depictions of Roman people. Sanders 6 In Defense of Stylistic Analysis The basis of this research project on Roman archaism is stylistic analysis. Stylistic analysis—that is, studying artworks in groupings based primarily on similar visual characteristics—has been at the center of increased debate within the field of art history in recent years. Most art historians, such as Jaś Elsner (2003), a British art historian and classicist, and Svetlana Alpers (1987), a former professor of History of Art at University of California, Berkeley, acknowledge that style has been a prominent method of analysis, but they also identify various problems that stylistic analysis as a methodology has.